Wag the dog: A science project for babies’ best friend.

Pet dogs are high up on the list of things that make babies laugh. But what makes dogs wag their tails? Some researchers in New York want to find out and would like your help. They are interested in how dogs and humans interact and what is involved when we play games with our four legged friends. They want you to send videos of you and your dog playing together. Here’s what they have to say about their project:

Hello! The Horowitz Dog Cognition Lab is run by Dr. Alexandra Horowitz, author of Inside of a dog: What dogs see, smell, and know. Our research group is based in New York City, and we study the behavior and cognition of companion dogs. Read more about us and our research at DogCognition.com. We are presently investigating play between dogs and people, and we need your help (well, you and your dog’s help)!

Join the study in these easy steps:

Complete a short survey

Upload a video of you and your dog playing i.e. you are in the video playing with your dog (however you like to play together)

Dogs and humans have been constant companions for at least the past 40,000 years. The same timeframe in which we can say for definite that we have been thoroughly modern in evolutionary terms. Humans domesticated dogs and we shaped them in our own highly social image. For example, a recent project here at Birkbeck found that dogs can ‘catch’ contagious yawns from their owners. There’s no doubt that studying dogs thoughts can tell us some interesting things about our own early cognition.